North Korea’s new submarine-launched missile raises threat of nuclear strike from the sea

State media reported that the weapon tested on Tuesday featured ‘flank mobility’ and ‘glide skip’, which can make a missile harder to track and intercept
Analysts say the SLBM appeared to be a smaller, thinner model, which could mean more missiles stored on a single submarine

Defence

Agencies

Published: 7:41am, 20 Oct 2021

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North Korea announced on Wednesday that it had tested a newly developed missile designed to be launched from a submarine, the first such weapons test in two years and one it says will bolster its military’s underwater operational capability – potentially slashing the time before US and allied forces in the region would need to be concerned about nuclear strikes from the sea.

The test on Tuesday was the fifth round of missile launches since September and came as North Korea steps up pressure on Washington and Seoul to abandon what Pyongyang sees as hostile polices such as joint US-South Korea military drills and international sanctions on the North.

North Korea’s state-run Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) said the latest test “demonstrates the military muscle” of the state and “will greatly contribute to putting the defence technology of the country on a high level and to enhancing the underwater operational capability of our navy”.

It said the new missile has introduced advanced control guidance technologies including flank mobility and gliding skip mobility.

This combination of pictures shows a test firing of a new type submarine-launched ballistic missile in an undisclosed location in North Korea on Tuesday. Photo: KCNA/KNS via AFP

Analysts noted that photos released by KCNA appeared to show a thinner, smaller missile than North Korea’s earlier SLBM designs, and may be a previously unseen model first showcased at a defence exhibition in Pyongyang last week.

Dave Schmerler, a senior research associate at the James Martin Centre for Non-Proliferation Studies in California, said it was unclear exactly what KCNA meant by “flank mobility”, but that “glide skip” is a way to change a missile’s trajectory to make it harder to track and intercept.

A smaller SLBM could mean more missiles stored on a single submarine, although with a shorter range, potentially putting nuclear-armed North Korea closer to fielding an operational ballistic missile submarine (SSB).

“Though a smaller North Korea SLBM design could enable more missiles per boat, it could also enable smaller less challenging SSB designs, including easier integration/conversion on pre-existing submarines,” Joseph Dempsey, a defence researcher at the International Institute for Strategic Studies, said on Twitter.

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However, the development was expected to have only a limited impact on Pyongyang’s arsenal until it made more progress on a larger submarine that has been seen under construction.

“It just means they’re trying to diversify their submarine launch options,” Schmerler said. “It’s an interesting development but with only one submarine in the water that can launch notionally one or two of these it doesn’t change much.”

KCNA said Tuesday’s launch was made from “the same 8.24 Yongung ship”, a submarine that North Korea said it used to conduct its first submarine-launched strategic ballistic missile test in 2016. This indicates Tuesday’s test was also a underwater-launched missile launch.

North Korean leader Kim Jong-un was not reported to have attended Tuesday’s test.

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The North’s neighbours said on Tuesday that they detected the North’s missile firing and said the weapon landed in the waters between the Korean peninsula and Japan.

South Korea’s military described the missile as a short-range submarine-launched ballistic missile and said the launch was made from waters near the eastern port of Sinpo, where North Korea has a major shipyard building submarines.

Tuesday’s launch is the most high-profile weapons test by North Korea since US President Joe Biden took office in January.

The Biden administration has repeatedly said it is open to resuming nuclear diplomacy with North Korea “anywhere and at any time” without preconditions. The North has so far rebuffed such overtures, saying US hostility remains unchanged.

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North Korea has been pushing hard for years to acquire the ability to fire nuclear-armed missiles from submarines, the next key piece in an arsenal that includes a variety of weapons including ones with the potential range to reach American soil.

Acquiring submarine-launched missiles would be a worrying development because that would make it harder for the North’s rivals to detect launches and provide the country with retaliatory attack capability.

Still, experts say it would take years, large amounts of resources and major technological improvements for the heavily sanctioned nation to build at least several submarines that could travel quietly in seas and reliably execute strikes.

North Korea last tested a submarine-launched ballistic missile in October 2019.

Nuclear negotiations between the US and North Korea have been stalled for more than two years because of disagreements over an easing of crippling US-led sanctions against North Korea in exchange for denuclearisation steps by the North.

Associated Press, Reuters, Bloomberg

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